06 apr 2010, 22:22
#96143
Den her post er fra AVforums, synes den virker troværdig og beskrivende omkring hans erfaringer med NX700 og HX700;
I have waited a while to buy a TV, I was going to buy the KDL Z5500 (think that was it) last last year but saw that Sony were going to bring out their HD range in March this year so decided to wait.
I quite liked the Samsung range of LED TV's but soon realised that their thiness sort of didn't help when it came to the likes of a Scart socket which is something I wanted but without the need for a conversion lead etc. Also, I have a friend who works in a TV repair centre and his comments were always that out of all the TV's he sees back (not that he can repair them) Samsung were the ones coming back the most.
So, Sony it was for me, (I'd done the Pansonic/Sharp/Pioneer research and a Pioneer Kuros was a little more budget wise for me then as their new ranges are no.
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I visited the Sony centre the day they took delivery of some of their new Range, they had on display an EX 503, 703 and the NX 703 , all of which were within my price to spend range.
I asked the staff at the Sony Centre for the remotes to each of the TV's plus the sky remote which was what was feeding the TV's and to be left alone for 30 minutes which they very kindly did.
Right from the start I was struck with clarity on the EX 703, it seemed more precise, a crisper edge to it than most of the other older Sony sets around it and I found the remote quite easy to acclimatise to. The iSync manual was excellent and I soon found myself messing with all the different fucntions on the set. I soon took it out of 'Shop Mode' and got messin with the brightness/contrast/colour etc..
As stated earlier I'm an end user that just likes to switch on the TV and watch it as a TV rather than as a conduit for a games console. I also like to watch the occasioal DVD and having recently purchased the Sony BDP 360 then things would be looking up.
I moved on to the NX 703, I loved the Monolith design, it was sleek, thin and looked amazing and that was switched off. I spent some time playing on it but try as I might I couldn't emulate the picture clarity of the ex 703 which left me a little disappointed but it's function such as 'scene select' and Wireless out of the box were certainly appealing.
The problem with being allowed to roam free with tv's in a shop is that you start comparing between the different sets to such a degree that you soon become dizzy, I reminded myself what I had come for, a TV that the family could enjoy and has a relative ease of use that even the Wife could get used to. I also wanted Freeview HD etc...
By the time I had made my decision I had the Sony staff member agreeing that there was better defnition in the EX 703 LCD that their was on the NX 703 LED and with that in mind I purchased the EX 703 with the caveat that if I wasn't happy I could exchange it for the NX 703 or similar (1 week )
Brought the set home, took the box out of the car and placed it in the front room ready to install....and then I did what I pomised myselfI wouldn't and I went reading the different specs on each of the sets I'd tried. Next morning I was back at the Sony Centre with the EX 703 still boxed and unopened.....I wanted the NX 703 ....
I had a quick play again with the NX 703 and oh yes this was the one for me, how had I missed it's clarity, the sharpness that only an LED seems to offer...and I was soon home with it (and £400 lighter of course) ...Same deal as before, try it, don't like it bring it back....within the week that was.
So, armed with the NX 703 I came home, put it in the front room and then put it together (simple stand configuration) and switched it on.....autotune was easy and within a few minutes I was watching TV like never before but then again my previous tv dare I say it was a Grundig 26in CRT from 1992 ...things were only ever going to look better..weren' they?
I get a good freeview signal so the epg soon picked up 99 channels (including radio) but I wasn't for the time being interested in that. I wanted my blu ray player on and Dark Knight to watch ( I'd watched it before in std dvd and gave up after a while...I then saw it again at a mates house on his 55in Samsung LED set and was blown away, so this watch it on Blu Ray in the comfort of my own home.
With the Chidren in bed the wife and I settled down to watch our first Blu Ray DVD (we know how to live...) ....BUT then almost as soon as the film started my usually sedate (when it comes to gadgets/audio/tv) wife chirped up 'ere, isn't there some shading around the top and right hand edge of the screen' ..we were 5 minutes in to the film...what did she know?...reluctantly I rewound the dvd and sure enough she was right...all around the edge of the NX 703 there was a sort of pointed shadow coming down from the top of the set, once could only describe it as a knife blade sort of shadow at varying intervals..bout 3 inches long and about 5 of them...so off with the blue ray and some more investigating/reading on here....and yes the set had the same problem as others have previously described...it wasn't good, what should be a pure white background looked like an overcast sky with clouding at the top....not good and not something I was happy spending £1399 for. I packed it back up the following day and took it back to the Sony Centre....their display one was on and I managed without much difficulty to demonstrate that theirs was the same....they were happy to exchange.
I left it with them and my money (I Trusted them, afterall they trusted me) and went away for a few days to do some more research...I eventually decided to try the HX 703, ok so it wasn't edge lit LED but instead LCD, but it had the BE3 engine, it was 200hz motion flow as opposed to the NX's 100 and it had the scene select just as the NX did,the menu was almost the same although the remote was a little different so why not....
Lucky the Sony Centre had just taken delivery of two of the HX's so put my name on one and went and fetched it, they hadn't as yet had time to put the other on displaym, oh dear...but in any case same drill as before, brought it home, unpacked it, ran the autotune, connected the blu-ray. Again the children were dispensed to bed and we were to settle down again to watch Dark Knight.
The resuls were altogether different, the picture was crisp, the colours vibrant and much more noticeable than the NX and the blacks were something else, dare I say it it was almost picture perfect and enjoy the film we did, the special effects of Dark Knight are amazing.
The following morning I put the tv through it's paces, I watched freeview, blu ray, terrestial,messed with remote, played with the functions all of which worked as I think they should.
Freeview Picture was good, I watched some football, the pitch looked realistic enough unlike the sometimes synthetic look given by some of the LED's I've seen, I was able to see the players run (motionfow on standard) without the usual blur and the numbers on the backs of the shirts were clear and did not seem to pixelate. I then managed to find some F1 Highlights and so stuck the motionflow into the 200hz mode, the results were instant, I could see the crowd as clear as could be when the cars were reaching the corners, the car itself and the detail even when they were on high speed straights was fantastic, this was what I was looking for. So far so good.
I've looked at the terrestial side but havent spent much time on the 5 channels available, ch5 is a good signal anyway but it was good enough for me.
I've read somewhere that the 200hz motion flow on the HX is a sort of economy version? All I can say is that I've took time in watching it on the varying levels, it works as I would expect it to do on sport ...and there is certainly a huge difference when it's switched off (where sport is concerned) and if left on my wife has to switch it off when watching the daytime trash tv etc, so she sees the difference as well.
The menu system on the Sony is good, It's isync manual is excellent and the xbar system works well and intergrates well with the sony blu ray. What I have found is that there is a bit of lag with the menu as in you can press what button you want but it can sometimes take a couple of seconds to load up which can if you let it be slightly annoying and the small inner circle of the select section can sometimes catch you out but the more we've used it the more we've gotten on with it.
The Scene select button does it for me, the ex 703 does not have it on (I don't think) but on the NX/HX it does and I have to say I'd miss it now, the TV usually picks up what you've got on and switches to it automatically but if it doesn't it usually sits in auto or general ..when you play with the menu settings for the picture the 'vivid' mode certainly makes things more vivid if not a little too plastic looking, I tend not to use it but instead set the contrast to abouyt 90, brightness to about 60 and the colour is around 55 to 58, I do sometimes vary it but not a lo. I haven't as yet worked out if you can set your 'favourites' so that the brightness/contrast/colour and sound work as you want them to without the need for adjustement.
The NX is network ready straight out of the box, my hx isn't and I've tried several different dongles without any luck, the Sony Centre now has the Sony Dongle in at around £70 which is a not too expensive so may go and buy one. I did get the NX on the net and watched Youtube videos (the quality was rubbish but thats small screen youtube to 40in Sony, it's never going to happen.
I'm peeved with Freeview, I can see both the Hints and Sutton masts from my window and my postcode states I should get it but it' now the 6th April and I along with just about everyone else does not seem to be able to receive it, It was live from 31st March of my local masts. I'll be really annoyed if freeview don't get their act together, part of why I purchased the new range Sony's was so that I could get freevieew HD.
There is far more on this set to play with than I'll ever need/require but essentially the HX 703 suits us perfectly. It is the Monolith design but I can confirm that because the HX is not the backlit led of it's counterpart the NX 703 then it's not as thin around the initial edge and yes the back part/edge does have a plastic feel to it but you know what, I don't look at the back part of the TV, I see only the front and it's flawless and looks exactly the same as the NX from where you should be sitting when watching your tv...in front?
There was a reason for me plumping for the Monolith design, I have two young daugthers it is inevitable that they will visit the screen with their fingers, on the standard lcd's such as the EX 503 their hands will distort the screen when it's touched as will the occasional toy when lobbed at it but with the HX you don't get that, the monolith design ensures it's better protected (although my wife thinks it will be a bitch to keep clean) and with such an expensive item that is focal to the front living room, well I think the monolith was worth the extra expense.
Incidentally, we have a topfield 5800 pvr that works via one of the two supplied scart sockets on the rear of the set, there is also 4 hdmi sockets of which two are on the side, 2 on the back and the usual audio out stuff. One other subtle difference that we like is the off switch on the side of the set, once that's off it's off, no power is supplied to the set which means we don' keep having to reach for the plug sockets.
Also, we've retuned many times looking for freeview HD all to no avail but I made the mistake on one occasion of searching for ALL ...this apparently searches all frequencies in all countries, all I can tell you is it takes over an hour and is an altogether waste of time.
I have figured out the ambience sensor which it has, I haven't as yet worked out all the various digitial/audio settings but I have worked out how to switch it on and enjoy it, it's sort of brought our living room back to life and it's certainly enhanced our 'nights in' , One other thing that may be worth noting and again it's the wife that pointed it out but after a few days of the HX being hooked up it seems to have gotten better still, the picture seems to have settled down, Jeremy Kyle (whoever he is) even looks human (or so she tells me)
Sorry if this review doesn't meet your expectations but as previously stated, we're not gaming fans and neither do we beat ourselves up on 'backlight bleed' or 'signal noise' and neither do we sit there night after night looking to criticise the set for every minor mishap that may occur, all I can say is that out of the EX/NX/HX the HX 703 suited us perfectly giving us the best overall picture/sound/enjoyment factor, it's crisp vibrance altogether wiped out the NX and it's monolith design topped the EX....
Someone said somewhere that the LCD's of Sony are at the very top of their game, they've had a few years to perfect them/get them right whereas the edge-lit LED's have a way to go yet before reaching the standard set by the LCD's and I'd very much go for that.
The HX 703 is now firmly part of our family and like all new additions we're still getting to know each other but we're confident of a long and happy relationship which along with the 5 year Sony Warranty give peace of mind.
I'd have mentioned the Sony Centre but not sure if it would get them in any trouble for allowing me a weeks grace to test/find the set I want but all I can say is their service/help and understanding were pivotal in helping us select our set, hats of to the Sony Centre in question.
I haven't prrof read this epistle and apologise in advance for any grammatical/spelling mistakes.
HX 703 ? Buy one and you won't look back.
